


tea time

by Eryn



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, Tea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-30
Updated: 2012-07-30
Packaged: 2017-11-11 01:31:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/472979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eryn/pseuds/Eryn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock just doesn't drink tea...but when he does he does it right</p>
<p>--- fills a kink-bingo square for food/drink</p>
            </blockquote>





	tea time

**Author's Note:**

> heavily inspired by [this post](http://enigmaticpenguinofdeath.tumblr.com/post/26358790781/a-guide-to-writing-sherlockian-tea-habits) about Sherlockian tea habits.  
> Especially the part after Sherlock where I sat and thought...nonono...it might be like you write it, but my head sais its  
> well...what I've written
> 
> thanks to Kryptaria for a quick readthrough and saying go ahead :)

Sherlock didn’t drink tea.

 

If he wanted to stay awake, he just did.

 

If he wanted to relax, he used.

 

If he wanted to be nice, … okay. He didn’t want to be nice. But if he would have wanted, he would have done something beside tea. Flattery perhaps.

 

Even after John moved in, Sherlock didn’t drink tea. Sure, John made him cup after cup and sometimes Sherlock would even grant his wish and take a sip before abandoning the cup again. But he didn’t drink tea. He drank coffee when it suited him, with enough sugar that it tasted of nothing and that was that.

 

When John complained about him always abandoning his cup, Sherlock would reply with something like ‘stop making it if it bothers you’ or ‘just transport’, if John was starting in on the ‘eat more drink more’ rant. He had his two litres a day and ate enough not to starve himself. That was it.

 

But tea, tea was something else.

 

He normally didn’t have time for it and do it properly. Tea wasn’t something you could rush, like John was wont to do. Tea wasn’t some cheap Tesco’s teabags of ‘what’s on sale today’ with milk that had luckily not gone bad yet.

 

No, tea was something to be savoured and Sherlock rarely had the time and leisure to indulge himself. So he just didn’t until John was gone to visit Harry and he’d just finished a moderately interesting case and life was good.

 

That was when he’d start the kettle - the one marked ‘water only’ in John’s precise handwriting - and dig through the cabinet for the one pot at the very back - earthenware, no label - that was the only thing he’d taken from Mommy’s pantry when he left home. The only thing that had made it from home to school to university to London. It held all he needed for the perfect indulgence.

 

The water was almost ready by the time he had the pot standing next to the kettle with a teapot and cup next to it. Both fine china - from the owner of a prestigious porcelain company, in thanks for a returning an artifact - and hidden away on a shelf in his bedroom.

 

Opening the pot alone already made him sigh in pleasure as he inhaled the smell of dried leaves. Take out the tea egg and the carefully measure two tea-spoons into it. Another deep breath and the pot was closed again. The egg was suspended into the pot and the water was ready. Boiled and then cooled down a few degrees.

 

He’d pour it slowly, watch the metal web fill, leaves floating until the ceiling held them down. Then it was red-brown streaks flowing from the egg to colour the water, give it was beautiful tint and then he’d put the kettle down and watch the water. It was always nice to see Brownian movement in action, watch the macroscopic manifestation of heat energy. He’d wait until the colour was right. He didn’t use a timer, because a tea-spoon wasn’t a precise amount so he had to go by colour to determine the moment where he raised the egg and placed it on a saucer.

 

The tea got another minute to stew while Sherlock stared down into the pot and inhaled the smell of finest Darjeeling like only his mother could procure - he never asked where she’d gotten it, but the pot in the kitchen was always full when he visited. After the minute he’d place the lid on the pot and carry the tray - metal, warm from the pot and with flower details hammered into it - into the livingroom where’d place it next to his armchair, on the small table, and sit down.

 

The armchair was old and stuffy but still just right to sink into. He relaxed, let his muscles unwind and watched the pot, steam gently rising from the spout.

 

Only when he was completely relaxed did he lean forward to pour the first cup, adding a splash of milk as he went. No sugar, no lemon, no other fancy. Sometimes he even let out the milk, maybe he’d do it for the second cup, so that he’d be left with only the taste of a foreign country in his mouth, floating over his tongue and down his throat in a delicate, warm wave before coiling his his belly, heating him from the inside out.

But the first one got a splash of milk to dull the taste.

 

It wouldn’t do to get lost in the first cup and forget about the second. The milk helped, giving it a creamy tang that settled on his teeth and called for more tea to wash it down.

 

The second cup only had what residue of milk was left from the first. It was enough to make the second cup taste different and new and still leave need for more. For the gentle pouring and long inhalation that came with the third cup.

 

There was about half a cup left in the pot, but that just couldn’t be helped. Carefully Sherlock would sit and hold cup number three. If he wanted he could linger an hour with this cup, inhaling and sipping and staring down into amber liquid, his mind letting itself be led around the palace from tea leaves to the fields of India to the Orient express and Murder over Agatha Christie back to England and London and Baker Street, where he’d sip the last of the tea and then put down the cup to recline in his chair and close his eyes.

 

He never stayed sitting for long. The can needed to be rinsed and washed before tea-stain could set in and the soggy tea leaves needed to be thrown out before the egg was cleaned and dried and then placed back into the pot that went to the back of the cabinet.

 

China and tray went back to his bedroom and he’d emerge wrapped in his dressing gown and ready for John to come home.


End file.
